Epoch
by mirroredsakura
Summary: SephirothxCloudxZack. PreNibelhiem shorts for ffthreesomes.
1. Chapter 1: Doubt

**Title:** Doubt

**Theme: **10, Comforting

**Notes: **Done for ffthreesomes on LJ. Forcefully doing something with the time that would otherwise be spent stewing over writer's block.

*

Sometimes Sephiroth felt uncomfortable around those two.

No, not sometimes. Oftentimes.

It was a painful feeling, when he thought on it, one he tried to ignore for their sakes. But it was there, when he saw Zack wrestle Cloud into a chokehold and poke fun at him before kissing him breathless, when Zack cheerfully and tirelessly helped train the boy with that mortuary slab of a sword, when he slipped into their double room during a mission after a late-night inspection to find the blond curled up asleep against Zack's chest in a futile attempt to wait up for him.

Like he didn't belong.

Sometimes he thought they knew. And then that made it worse because they just tried so much harder to let him in, bring him closer, and that made him wonder if that was asking too much of them.

Sometimes he thought of leaving and letting that perfect camaraderie exist unmolested and uncontested. But he was just a little too selfish for that, and it made him _happy_ to see Zack turn to him and wrap his arms around him and call him 'Seph' with no concern whatsoever as to rank, decency or decorum, to hear Cloud's clarion laughter ringing clear and unfettered the few times the boy rode behind him on his chocobo and had the temerity to relax in his presence.

He needed them. When he went stumbling back to his quarters in the dead of night after hours of Hojo's probing questions and experiments and evaluations to find Zack with hot chocolate a blessedly understanding silence and a warm embrace, when Cloud gathered enough courage to lean up and kiss him as if it were explanation enough for all his doubts, which at the time, always felt like it was. When they managed to drag him into their bed and fall asleep in a tangle of limbs and warm bodies and beating hearts and slow breathing.

They filled him; a part of him that had always stood empty. So, more than he felt like he didn't belong, he felt like he wanted this never to end.

They were his family.

And he might almost believe they would always be there for him.

*

Forcefully doing something with the time that would otherwise be spent stewing over writer's block.


	2. Chapter 2: For Your Eyes Only

**Title:** For Your Eyes Only

**Theme: **9, General opinion

*

General opinion stated General Sephiroth was a cold, arrogant bastard of a leader who destroyed all opposition with brutal efficincy.

Zack thought general opinion could stand to take it up the ass a couple of times with the Shinra flagpole, lubed up with battery acid and handed an incendiary grenade or two for effect. Cloud thought Zack could stand to be a little less graphic, but he tended to agree when Zack went rampaging over that sort of thing anyway so that didn't matter so much.

But after all, who really cared what general opinion thought? Zack had made a lifetime career of ignoring stuff like that, and he sometimes suspected it was this part of him that made both Seph and Cloud stick around with him like they did. Even if he'd wanted to, he wasn't about to change if that kept them around. Fuck what others thought about them; the illustrious Silver General who was always silent and aloof and walked like he _owned_ Shinra, the ambitious SOLDIER who'd probably sold his ass to said General in order to snatch his spot in First Class, the kicked little puppy of a cadet that never smiled and shied away from personal contact like he'd never received any in his life.

Zack knew better. He'd seen Sephiroth's smile, faint and barely-there when the man finally fell asleep ensconced between Cloud and himself. He'd heard Cloud's laughter ring loud and clear when they were far away from the looming Shinra building and out in the fields with only the ocean on the horizon. He'd seen his own eyes when he looked in the mirror and the quiet contentment he saw just to have them with him, here, now, for as long as they were willing to stay.

*

Zack's so much fun to play with.


	3. Chapter 3: High Above Me

**Title:** High Above Me

**Theme: **6, Distance

*

It wasn't just a question of _height_, Cloud had been short for a very long time and one got used to—but not resigned, no, never resigned!—being smaller than everyone else after a while although the two of them _did_ tower over him quite a good deal. Nor was it a question of _strength_, not when Cloud could still dream his big dreams of being like them someday, shouldering that big buster sword of Zack's like it weighed nothing and standing tall like Sephiroth.

It was… it was…

Cloud wasn't sure. Perhaps just the sinking feeling that despite the dreams and the starry-eyed hopes, he could never fly that high, never be like the two of them. It was just who they _were_—a voice like silk that inspired obedience within even the most unruly of troops, an unfaltering smile that was always warm, always encouraging, always accompanied with that _laugh_. That was something he could never imitate, and it set him apart from them. They looked so _good_ together; Zack was all charm and warmth and good looks and Sephiroth was quiet and calm and _beautiful_, like how Cloud had never imagined a man could be. And so Cloud felt that distance.

But they accepted him. Zack, who never seemed able to keep from touching him whenever the man was given even half a chance, and Sephiroth who gave him that grave smile and encouraged him every step of the way. They wanted him, and sometimes he might pretend they needed him too.

Sometimes he could pretend they weren't quite so high above him after all.

*

Last one for tonight (read: this morning), I'm rather tired. yawns


	4. Chapter 4: Girlfriend

**Title:** Girlfriend

**Theme: **#2 Lovebite

*

Aeris knew.

…Well of course she knew. She was Aeris. She had eyes as green as Sephiroth's and usually just as uncanny; as if they could look through you, into you and past you into a future that pained her to see.

But it had still hurt when she'd found out.

Neither she nor Zack had thought that it would hurt quite so much to find out like that.

Of course, Zack could have thought of better ways to bring up the subject—and to be fair, he'd tried. Dinner, a long walk, considerable distance between Aeris and that staff of hers…

She saw it as she kissed him and he slipped up for the first time—truthfully he hadn't much experience in trying to fool his girlfriend. And her kisses were intoxicating; she smelled like flowers and sunlight and warm earth. She was something else, Aeris was, and Zack would be the first to drop everything and swear forwards, backwards, and upside down that he loved her. Even if he happened to be sleeping with his two best friends. Who also happened to be men.

But she still stopped short at the sight of the first of a line of hickeys down his throat as he craned his neck to kiss her more deeply. She still pulled away and tugged down his collar with fingers that suddenly felt weighted down by lead and the guilt that she could see flare up all too noticeably in Zack's violet eyes. And she still felt the stinging of tears welling up in the corners of her eyes as she asked, "Who?"

So he told her.

He spared the details of course; the satin of Cloud's skin shuddering delicately under his roughened fingertips and the heavy silken weight of Seph's hair draped across all three of them. But it was enough.

There were many things Aeris could have done then, things she might have said—things she could never forgive herself for doing and saying if they'd actually happened. She could have screamed at him. Hit him. Kicked him out of her house and ordered him never to darken her doorstep ever again.

She picked the best course of action—the one she always elected to do… she tried to run. To the church, to the garden where it would be quiet and she could _think_ like she knew she needed to do.

She wasn't ready to be angry at Zack. She didn't _ever_ want to be angry at Zack.

*

Because we can't simply forget that Aeris existed at this time too.


	5. Chapter 5: Next Time

**Title: **Next Time

**Theme: **#10 Compromise

*

Anyone who was anyone in Midgar would have said it was silly trying to run from a SOLDIER. But then, anyone who was anyone in Midgar would have said it was silly trying to run from a Turk, and Aeris had been doing that for years.

However, the moment she threw the door open, she ran into a chocobo.

Or so she thought at first.

When she managed to fall into it and send the both of them sprawling, and she found that the chocobo was in Shinra blues and had made a started "_Oof!_" sound upon being landed on, and not a "_Wark!_" at all, she realized this was probably not the case.

She also realized the boy was really, really cute.

And that she'd been nose-to-toe with a very large boot. Looking up granted her a sight of a very large, leather-clad cr—ah, sword. And a face even further up framed with long silver hair.

She had time for an instinctive _Oh my that _is _sexy_ before she remembered that she was upset and that these people were from Shinra and thus was possibly after her—both excellent reasons to flee.

That was before they started to speak. All of them. At once.

"Aeris, babe, _please—!_"

"Miss Gainsborough! Oh please, it's about Zack; I mean we really, honestly, didn't want to do _anything_ to hurt you and neither would he, he's always so _happy _when he talks about you and we wouldn't want to do anything to hurt either of you—"

"Miss Gainsborough, I believe we really must talk to you about—"

It was just like the voices in her head, clamoring to be heard, except louder and _real_ and—"_STOP!_"

As one, they did. There was silence for a long moment, one where she could look this chocobo chick of a boy in the face and see him desperate to play mother hen to Zack, _Zack_ of all people, who knew better than anyone how to take care of himself and everyone around him, and this sedate _cat_ of a man standing over them, serene and stern and still so incredibly awkward and unsure of what exactly he was here to say, but desperate to say something, anything, that might make her understand.

She knew then—these were the people who loved Zack.

And then she couldn't help but wonder—who _could_ keep from loving Zack? It was all too obvious _she_ couldn't… who could run from that face?

She felt his hands and then his arms close around her, delicately lifting her up off the blond, as effortlessly as if she weighed nothing, setting her on her feet right next to him. It was all she could do to keep from leaning into him.

"Please babe, can't we talk about this?" His voice was too sad, too hopeful for her to answer just then.

She was silent for another long moment, watching as the blond boy scrambled to his feet, and the silver-haired man—that one had to be Sephiroth, who _wouldn't_ be able to recognize that face of Shinra that they pasted everywhere in the city and on the television?—reached for him almost instinctively to help. She watched as he jerked back when the boy squeaked and the both of them stared awkwardly at each other as the one blushed red with embarrassment and the other's eyes widened for just a moment with indecision and something approaching panic, and the both of them _apologizing, _and…

They were adorable. Like children, who'd never learned how to show affection, or even to recognize it.

No wonder Zack had wanted to adopt them and love them like they were supposed to be loved.

The two of them noticed she was watching them almost immediately and they both stiffened into what she assumed must be a parade stance, or whatever those military types called that poker-stiff stand they did during their show-off displays, and glanced uncertainly at each other for a moment before their eyes turned to Zack as if synchronized.

They needed him.

"Yeah…" she murmured, turning to Zack and forcing her eyes to meet his. "Yeah, I think we should talk."

Later, she was glad that the only thing she could say after all their mishmash explanations was, "The least you could have done was let me watch." It was almost worth it to see the worry softening out of Zack's face and the Chocobo's face turning a bright red and the General's eyes widening fractionally into something that must be awe.

It was enough to see Zack smile like that; like he could never be made any more happier. Aeris had the sudden feeling of _knowing_ without uncertainty or doubt, that he would never love her _less_ merely because the others needed and loved him _more_.

There was something broken about the two of them, something that only Zack seemed to be making any headway in fixing. How could she begrudge them that?

Just…

"Don't leave me out next time?" was all she could ask of them.

Both she and Zack knew that was probably impossible. They were Shinra… and no one knew better just how much Shinra wanted her back in her little birdcage than she did. Being with Zack was dangerous enough. If she were seen with General Sephiroth himself…

There was no telling _who_ would be ordered to bring her back in chains. Her little cat-and-mouse game with Tseng and the Turks would no longer half be a game, not if President Shinra took notice of her presence himself. And with such illustrious company as a SOLDIER First Class and the Silver General himself, how could he not?

…But perhaps they could videotape?

*

Longer than the others, but I still think it's a bit short for what I wanted to show. Quicksilver personality, patient, kind and understanding or not, finding out about your boyfriend's boyfriends isn't something you say "Oh. Okay then!" to so easily. I was the most worried about Aeris being IC in this one… I hope I managed all right. I'm rather afraid I didn't, but if I went too far into that, it wouldn't stay very short and I think I want to save that for a long fic sometime in the future.


	6. Chapter 6: On Time

**Title: **On Time  
**Theme: **#5, Variation

*

Sephiroth had a schedule. A routine. A way of doing things that he adhered to in strict detail. Each day and every day. As the leader of the largest corporate army on the Planet, it was almost second nature.

"Would it honestly be a matter of national security if the great General Sephiroth left his office exactly eight and a half minutes early?"

"Would it honestly kill you to wait that long?" he replied mildly, signing off the latest of the express-couriered documents dumped in neat, exact-cornered piles on his desk.

"Seph, movie starts at 9. That gives us exactly half an hour to wrestle Spike out of the shower, down to the theater, past the ticket booth, and past the snack counter." Zack's grin widened as he craned his neck just enough to catch Sephiroth's eye from his position sprawled across the General's couch. "And you've never seen Spike in the shower. Or me at a candy counter, now that I think about it."

While he suspected Zack would act like the child Sephiroth sometimes suspected he was, he did not rise to that bait, "I do not see why in Planet's name I must come with you to see… to see…"

"_The Curse of the Dark Materials_."

"That. It sounds ridiculous."

Zack shrugged, crossing his arms comfortably over his chest. "Think it's supposed to be. B-rated horror; plenty of over-acting, fake blood, loud screaming, monsters popping out screaming _I kill now_."

"Fascinating," Sephiroth replied dryly, "Tell me again why you would wish to submit Strife and I to such a form of mindless entertainment."

"I'm taking you someplace you two've never been. Gotta be worth something, right?"

"So the best that you could come up with is B-rated horror," a new voice commented, as Sephiroth's door bleeped open and Strife stepped in with a quiet little half-smile, blond spikes still dripping water onto the white of the shirt he'd pulled on in place of his uniform.

Zack pounced on him immediately to nuzzle up against the blond's neck, and even Sephiroth couldn't quite blame him; the widening breadth of his shoulders, the added height and muscle, the way he didn't flinch when Zack leaned over to kiss him, though his cheeks still reddened when Zack finally did. Zack had done that, transformed the boy into something _more_. Not the physical changes of course, but the way he carried himself lately, that confidence. It had always been there, but it'd taken Zack to bring them out.

Sephiroth was quite certain that he himself might never—_mmph_.

He blinked when Cloud pulled away from the kiss, face growing even redder as he held Sephiroth's eyes, "That was your thinking face," he said as if in explanation, and while his eyes looked like he might apologize, his soft little half-smile didn't. Before Sephiroth could demand clarification, Zack filled in the rest as he slipped arms around Sephiroth's shoulder. The General could feel the hum of contentment at his back when he didn't stiffen at the contact, "The one where you're looking but thinking you can't belong."

"But you can."

"And you _will_." Zack's voice was insistent, as were the teeth nibbling along the line of his neck. If Sephiroth's self-control wasn't what it was, he might have groaned into that touch.

"And you're—hey, Zack, aren't we going to be late?"

A quick glance of the clock had Sephiroth half on his feet before he felt the arms around his neck and shoulders tightening, "Yeah," Zack replied, threading his fingers through the heavy silk of Sephiroth's hair, leaning just the slightest bit more as a cue to keep him seated. "But we can skip the previews." The rumbling purr at his neck said Zack likely preferred it this way.

The breathless little hum Cloud made against Sephiroth's lips a second time said the blond likely agreed.

Who was he to argue with that? He pulled Cloud closer with a soft sound of contentment. Zack hardly needed all that popcorn either.

Sephiroth had a schedule which he adhered to in strict detail. Zack and Cloud were hardly the only ones who had approached him telling him that was not exactly necessary in peacetime, but it was only the two of them who could tell him 'variety is the spice of life' and drive the point home _quite_ so well…

*

A little weak maybe, but I needed something to get me out of a slump. RPing ate up all my fandom-writing time I swear. And I can't let that happen! So… call this a kick-start.


	7. Chapter 7: Instead of Sharing

**Title: **Instead of Sharing  
**Theme:** #8, Coffee

Coffee.

*

Cloud could never really understand the allure. It tasted like reactor waste. Or what he always imagined reactor waste to taste like; he'd never exactly had the dubious pleasure himself. Especially the stuff they served in the Shinra mess hall.

Yeah, once in a while he got caught up in all the apparent charm, saw the other guys straddling their seats and calling out "Coffee. Black." Tough as the nails that could probably stand up straight in that sludge. Once in a while he had it in him to try it out, just to see if his tastes had changed. Happened sometimes. He usually managed about the first three tentative sips before he poured in the sugar and the milk by the gallon. That way he could make it to about the seventh before giving up entirely and tossing out the whole mess into the nearest trash receptacle.

So he could never quite understand why Zack looked at him in jealous awe every morning he managed to flop down with Cloud's unit and make pathetic grasping motions towards the coffee pot. Sometimes if someone didn't hand him an empty mug fast enough, Zack would down the stuff straight from the pot itself with a shudder and a sigh before he repeated that boneless sprawl and let the mess work its magic, restoring his ability to string words together. It wasn't like you needed that stuff just to wake up, after all.

Of course Zack always just groaned and tossed rolled-up socks at him if he said as much. Especially in the morning.

Cloud had used to chalk it up to perhaps being a SOLDIER thing, just something else he might have to get used to if—no, he had to have confidence, had to believe—_when_ he made it into the ranks.

But Sephiroth didn't understand it either, raised an eyebrow when Zack spilled onto his couch cuddling with his mug of the liquid, and often inquired politely whether or not Zack knew if the sludge he was swallowing happened to be toxic or not. So maybe it was just a Zack-thing.

Well, that was okay. Zack was Zack, and Zack was greedy like that, purring over his cup as if it were precious. Zack was often greedy. About almost everything. About life and love and everything around him. He wanted it all—didn't expect it, didn't ever demand it, but if they let him, he hoarded them close as he could, as hard as he was able. Cloud didn't mind that, so long as he and Sephiroth were allowed to be greedy too and keep Zack just as close.

Cloud was pretty sure they got the better end of the deal anyway. Zack took all of the coffee and left all of the milk and cookies. Sephiroth took the milk, Cloud took the baked goods. Breakfast, when it was just the three of them—and it very often wasn't—was harmony like that.

Zack could keep the coffee. Cloud had what he wanted.

*

Heavy-handed? Me? Well now, middle-name, didn't you know?


	8. Chapter 8: Uniform

**Title: **Uniform  
**Theme: **#7, Blue

*

The day they found out nearly blew everything apart.

The official answer was that Cloud Strife had no sense of coordination, did not meet height requirements.

The side-whisper of the smirking superior was _No way I'm letting Fair's little lapdog bitch into SOLDIER. _And Hojo… Hojo had been there, had been nodding along and _grinning_ at him with a vindictive little smile that said he knew everything that was going on between Cloud and Zack and Sephiroth and he wanted some way to control that. Zack could see it, even if he couldn't hear anything through the soundproofed glass of the door.

If Zack had been inside, Zack would have smashed their faces in right then and there. He was strong enough. He was quick enough. All he could do instead was listen, later, to Cloud's hollow, stilted story of what had happened and read between the lines. Hojo had backed the stupid, flimsy excuse because he wanted something to dangle in front of Sephiroth, play another one of his little games, offer a _trade_. Take away what little freedom and dignity Sephiroth had managed to carve for himself because then he could help his little _boyfriend_.

And they… all of them… maybe even Zack himself, a little, were blaming themselves. Cloud… oh gods, Cloud. Making SOLDIER was everything to him, the dream that'd dragged him all the way to Midgar, through all that time learning and training and studying and…

_There's always next year,_ the guy had said when Cloud had stumbled out—he'd caught the tail-end of that condescending tone. Not a consolation because he knew, he _had_ to realize how this had broken something inside Cloud. The thought of if he failed now, what would stop him from failing next year? And it wasn't Cloud's _fault,_ damn it. Cloud was good. Damn good. Better than some of the other candidates that'd gotten put through. Just because of some stupid fucked up Shinra politics…

And that was why _Seph_ was blaming himself.

The General was a smart man. A genius. It didn't take him long to put the story together either, and then after pressing a hand on Cloud's shoulder, jaw clenched and unable to speak, he had locked himself in his office. And Zack knew. It'd taken him this long to believe that hey, it was okay, could be okay for all of them. And this was as good as Hojo saying, _it's because of his relationship with you that I won't let him join the ranks_. And it wasn't Seph's fault either.

But Zack didn't know how to show them that when they were hidden away inside themselves. He didn't know how to fix this.

And that felt like failing them both.

He wanted there to be something he could do. Cloud was _good_, was better than good, and didn't deserve this hierarchal bullshit Hojo was pulling on them. Didn't deserve his dreams being stepped on like this. Didn't deserve to be stuck in Shinra blues forever.

But this… this was something that wasn't up to him.

*

A little scattered, a little short. :\ Maybe I'm slipping? Well, at least I know RPing's taught me how to write short instead of epic-like-whoa. Progress, that! ;


	9. Chapter 9: Instead of Speaking

**Title: **Instead of Speaking

**Theme: **#1, Passionate

*

It occurred to Zack afterwards that the sex might not have been the best way to go about things.

Not that it hadn't worked. It had. Sort of. The two of them had _responded_, and Zack had been so fucking relieved that for a little while, that was all he could ask for. So he'd let himself go a little too, lost himself in the slick furnace heat of Cloud's mouth, the rolling rhythm of Sephiroth's hips… For just that littlest while, spooned up against them and tangled in their arms and legs, reaching out and touching and holding, he'd let himself believe that everything was okay.

Well, sex was just a temp fix, if it even was one at all.

He had a feeling afterwards that talking might have been a better solution. And that would have worked for him because Zack was pretty good at talking. It might also have done something a bit more permanent, drive his point home a bit better, keep that haunted look that kept showing up in their eyes more and more often lately at bay. But the others weren't good at talking, and Zack hadn't had it in him to force them to try then.

Afterwards, they might have talked. Maybe. Only maybe.

Because the trend had been set. And the other two didn't seem to know what to say or how to say it. It was on their faces, the tips of their tongues—Zack could see it, noted it with frustrated patience and tried to draw them out but never could.

So they had more sex.

A lot more sex.

Desperately.

As if they really did want to tell the rest of them something, something important, apologize maybe, say they didn't want this to end perhaps. But couldn't. And so they just held on, so that when words failed them, there was still heat and skin and touch and taste, drinking the others in as if they had to keep each other's mouths busy, otherwise someone would say something that really would tear them all apart.

It helped. Gods knew it helped.

But it didn't _fix_ things.

Still, what else could he do? He done all he knew how—he was there, right there beside them both, and while he didn't force them to talk he encouraged them…

Time. That's what he needed to have, needed to do. Give them time. They had to work things out with themselves, before they could try and work things out with each other.

In the meantime, he had to keep them all together, give them that chance so that when they did, when they figured things out, maybe even came to him to help figure things out, the other would still be there, just as ready, just as willing to make things work.

Zack knew them. Knew this was precious to them, knew that this, all of this, having people, having friends, having lovers, being loved, being _wanted _like this was important to them. They wouldn't be able to give it up on their own, but they might let it fall apart while they were busy thinking. Well, he wouldn't let it, and they'd figure it out.

Just a little more time. That was all he needed.

_Please._

*

*purrs* Finally, _finally _finished. Honestly, Word killed this fic three times in the writing of it and it's changed drastically from what I originally intended to what it is now. I don't think I'm all that upset with that change. This Zack is much easier/natural to write than an angsting Cloud and Sephiroth trying to awkwardly apologize to each other.


	10. Chapter 10: Back on the Road Again

**Title: **Back on the Road Again

**Theme: **#4, Rainy Day

*

The tapping of the rain on the gigantic panes of glass was insignificant. The rumbling growl of thunder was a nuisance, but ignorable. The lightning however, bothered him. The crackling discharge scattered around them from the lightning rods erected just a floor or two above them at the very top of the Shinra Headquarters. He'd have rather conducted this meeting elsewhere, in places more accommodating to his work, but Sephiroth was adamant and the President had been inclined to grant Sephiorth's request.

"Disgusting."

Sephiroth just looked at him with cool eyes, betraying nothing. Hmph.

There'd been days in the past that face hadn't been so composed. Hadn't been so calm when Hojo stood over him. He'd seen fear then. Stark terror from a child born to be greatest scientific breakthrough since the discovery of mako. Before the conditioning. Before the training. Before a very many things.

He'd have liked to see such terror in that face now. See this arrogant young man that the solemn-eyed boy had grown up into understand exactly who it was that tugged his strings, who still the hand of control. Even though his experiment wouldn't return to the labs like he was supposed to after his initial release into the outside, even though he refused to breed and dallied instead with those _boys_ of his, Hojo still controlled him, and he wanted it ingrained in the great General Sephiroth's _mind_.

"You will have to be more specific."

The words were cool, calm, rigidly polite. And Hojo hated them. They were not adorned with even a single 'sir' to denote Sephiroth's acceptance of Hojo's superiority, that he was doctor, master, father.

_Father._

Ha.

Ha ha ha ha ha ha.

What would he do if ever found out, the great General Sephiroth? Hojo could imagine it, just for the look on the man's face. Would that perfect little mask of his crack? Would he say what he truly thought for once?

The thought was a tempting one, but only for a moment. It was foolish to think of merely human gratification. Hojo had better things in mind for Sephiroth, bigger plans, greater feats and larger hoops for his greatest specimen to jump through. Once he knew more, perhaps then he could have the satisfaction of taking apart this prototype, tearing him open by the seams with the neat, tidy lines of the scalpel and building something better, something greater than this disrespectful trash.

But calm, calm. He was only a specimen. Hardly reason enough for a man of genius to work himself up over.

"Your choice of companionship," he replied instead, feeding the age-old strife between them. "Useless and disgracing."

"They have names."

"Forgettable names." His lips curled. Oh he remembered them, all right. Zack Fair. Cloud Strife. A nauseatingly matched pair if he ever saw one, right down to their surnames. If he had his way he would so enjoy erasing them as he had Sephiroth's.

There was no answer to that for a moment, but there was that humming of barely-contained anger in the air around the silver-haired man, the inhuman eyes narrowed and even colder than before.

Hojo didn't care. His mind was busy considering the results scratched out in ink on his sheets. Another flare of lightning and a gust of wind spattering the rain loudly against the glass distracted him again. How annoying. Hojo had always been of the opinion that such things should happen in a well-ordered, timely fashion. Contained and tightly controlled and under the most rigid of circumstances.

He turned his thoughts forcefully back to the matter at hand; consulting the charts, briefly consulting several of his notes. Oh yes, his experiments were moving along quite well indeed—

"But not enough to escape your attention."

Hojo looked up irritably. Now really, Sephiroth should know better than to speak while Hojo was in the midst of utilizing his genius. The man complied so very well in this very small thing most of the time, why must he interrupt now with inane chatter?

…Ah. The boy.

It was a challenge. Hojo's thin smile widened, delighted. The man's chafing at his bonds meant he knew they were there. A victory of sorts in and of itself, "Oh hardly because of their own merits," he replied. And that was true enough. The one had too much heart and the other… well… the other was simply a mess. Hojo had seen the psych tests. Idly he'd wondered if the boy would come out of the round of first injections with his brain leaking from his ears.

Pity. He'd have loved to see Sephiroth's face if such a thing came to pass.

"You know I have to maintain strict records of my specimens' environments," he added. "You are hardly the exception to the rule."

Sephiroth had grown complacent. Confident in his position at Shinra. This experiment would not provide him with any new data. Perhaps it was time to set in motion the other plan, the greatest one.

Perhaps it was time for Sephiroth to meet his Mother.

…Oh what data he could gather from _that_.

_Reunion._

It was enough to make any man of science giddy at the mere thought. Hojo could only wonder why it had taken him this long to decide. It certainly wasn't paternal instinct.

*

"How'd it go?"

Zack could no more hide the undertones of worry than Cloud could hide it in his downcast features. But that was hardly new. It was the way things had been lately; Zack refused to stay away and Cloud refused to look at him.

"It went." Sephiroth replied shortly.

Something about that meeting was off. Very off. More so than they had been every other time he'd been forced back to Hojo for his semi-regular tests. His mind screamed _trap_ but he couldn't decipher _why_.

"To the nearest mako reactor to drown itself in screaming agonies or up into the air to sing its own praises?"

That was Zack for you. Even in the tensest situations, he could always think of something to say, no matter how strained he sounded.

"I'm sure you can guess." He paused, "Pack. We ship out at 0500."

"New mission? Already?"

"Yes. Pack." His eyes turned to Cloud, and again there was that feeling of uneasiness. Hojo had specifically requested them both. "You too."

The blond's eyes jerked up to him for a brief instant before slipping down, to examine the scuffing on his coat instead. "Where?"

"Nibelheim."

Cloud went _white_. "I—"

"I know."

"Seph…"

"I _know_."

Later, when he was back in his own quarters, he could lean against the wall, close his eyes, _think_. Not about the impending mission, that could wait. No, there were more important things. The look on Cloud's face, for one.

Sephiroth had left off apologizing—actually _saying_ the words instead of mouthing them into the other's skin—for far too long.

He had excuses. His skill did not lie in speech. He couldn't even be certain he knew what he would say _now_. And he did not wish to undo all the good that had been done.

_Time._

But that was all they were. Excuses. And Sephiroth was not a coward. He _would_ say them, wouldn't let this thing he wanted to keep so badly slip away simply because he refused to relinquish his pride to those who mattered most.

_Just a little more time._

When they reached the town then. Far away from the prying eyes, the knowing sneers, from Midgar's influence. From the dark, choking clouds and the rain lashing the windows. There he could. There he _would_.

_Please._

He could fix things. Somehow. Couldn't he?

**End**

*

:O I finished! Actually finished something! It's been so long, maybe a year, maybe more that I actually started something multi-chaptered… and finished! Squee! It's… not a happy ending in the least, but… but… D: Yes. I'm a little _meh_ on it still, but I will look it over later. For now, I have a few hours of FFXII to play before I get down on the studying.


End file.
